Quote Originally Posted by Tachikaze
If you can find some balanced articles about him on the Internet, please pass on the links. It's hard for me to find good information. The news here is so slanted or incomplete. While some of our news agencies don't treat him as a wacko, they spend more words on the controversies than the substance of the man and his policies.

I hope you're right about him.
There was a brilliant article written in the New Statesman at the end of last year which sums up Chavez's achievements fairly well.

http://www.newstatesman.com/200510100012

I believe you have to pay for articles or be a subscriber, but I also think you can view one article a day free of charge, so you should be able to see it.

If you want some more personal accounts and further information, Johann Hari did two good articles on him when he went to Venezuela.

http://www.johannhari.com/archive/article.php?id=653

http://www.johannhari.com/archive/article.php?id=656

All worth reading by all.